David Moyes

[NickNack]

Grealish
Ndaiye
KDH
Gana
Branthwaite

All missing, and then you add in Alcaraz who's our backup 10, and Tim who's the only player who brings any dynamism when the player above are out.

Anyone getting pissed off maybe needs to take a second and consider how on earth we're supposed to do anything without all those available?

Learning how to kick the ball from the penalty spot would be a start. If I was Beto or Barry I’d be ashamed of myself. That and Grealish getting stupidly sent off the other night have pissed me right off at a time we can least afford to lose any quality players. Utterly brainless by the three of them

[Paddockoldie]

I can understand penalties can be tricky, but I can't understand how a striker can miss. A defender, midfielders etc, but strikers should know how to 'strike' a ball...

[Stumpy]

Learning how to kick the ball from the penalty spot would be a start. If I was Beto or Barry I’d be ashamed of myself. That and Grealish getting stupidly sent off the other night have pissed me right off at a time we can least afford to lose any quality players. Utterly brainless by the three of them

It's no shock to see Beto anad Barry miss from the spot.
They're sub standard players and they delivered sub standard penalties.
That's why garner took the last min pen, because neither of them could be trusted.
I knew the second the final whistle went we were out, there's too many of that starting line up you can't rely on in moments like that

[Toddacelli]

Everyone keeps saying ''he should be playing young players and developing them more'' but we're not in a comfortable enough position to do that.

Nothing wrong with the logic of this statement, but you also have to question why he persisted with McNeil on the right and/or left for as long as he did without bringing someone in for the last 10 or 15 mins? Why he persisted with O’Brien at right back without giving Patterson the last 20 mins to see how it impacted the game.

So you’re right to say we’re not in a good position for developing youngsters right now, but there have imo been opportunities, albeit small ones.

[Risky]

Nothing wrong with the logic of this statement, but you also have to question why he persisted with McNeil on the right and/or left for as long as he did without bringing someone in for the last 10 or 15 mins? Why he persisted with O’Brien at right back without giving Patterson the last 20 mins to see how it impacted the game.

So you’re right to say we’re not in a good position for developing youngsters right now, but there have imo been opportunities, albeit small ones.

I think this is the reality of where we are with Moyes really. Overall being objective, he's been a big part in getting us in to a good position, one which is a great place to be in comparison to where we've been over recent seasons. It's sometimes easy to forget that though because of some of the frustrating decisions and apparent stubbornness, that we're all too familiar with over the years with Moyes.

My own personal biggest frustration with him this season has been that when he came back a year ago I really thought he'd become a bit more relaxed and dare I say it progressive, but right now we're seeing the same old Moyes that used to really frustrate us back in the day. I think there's some genuine things to be frustrated by as well, however you can't really argue that overall we're in a far better place than we've been for years and that he's played a massive part in getting us there.

It may not be exciting, and he'll continue to make decision that drive us insane, but taking everything in to account we've really not got a lot to complain about.

[Toddacelli]

I think this is the reality of where we are with Moyes really. Overall being objective, he's been a big part in getting us in to a good position, one which is a great place to be in comparison to where we've been over recent seasons. It's sometimes easy to forget that though because of some of the frustrating decisions and apparent stubbornness, that we're all too familiar with over the years with Moyes.

My own personal biggest frustration with him this season has been that when he came back a year ago I really thought he'd become a bit more relaxed and dare I say it progressive, but right now we're seeing the same old Moyes that used to really frustrate us back in the day. I think there's some genuine things to be frustrated by as well, however you can't really argue that overall we're in a far better place than we've been for years and that he's played a massive part in getting us there.

It may not be exciting, and he'll continue to make decision that drive us insane, but taking everything in to account we've really not got a lot to complain about.

I agree. For that reason when he came back and was doing well, I commented something along the lines of “We’ve got the best version of Moyes” or something. But it seems the old flaws are still apparent.

[Trowel]

Whenever I start getting fussy about Moyes, I take a look at West Ham.

We shouldn't forget that that the entire technical, support, scouting, board, ownership, etc. etc. structure around him is relatively new to the club, and needs to be allowed time, transfer windows, and budget, and space to do proper succession planning.

[777Kidnappings]

Something has to give if the transfer committee and moyes arent aligned on signings. Theres no point us spending 80m on players moyes doesn't want to play again

[Cods]

Today again you could see his limitations. There was no surprise that the AFCON was coming and that the Christmas schedule is busy and taking its toll...
But Did he try to ease in the younger ones to prepare for the this situation? Or even let them have 10-15 mins here and there? Nope. He runs his preferred XI to the ground and then expect the young ones to come in all at once and accomplish what exactly?
It's one thing to play as a youngster with the rest of first team XI and a whole other matter to play when there is basically a complete second string.
That's not how to develop youngsters....

In one sense Im happy he got us to 29 points and well on the way to safety so quickly. It eased a huge weight for us, imagine if we were in another year of relegation trouble.

Get the runs on the board as quickly as possible, then you can relax a bit and rest/test the squad.

[toffee_scot]

We’ve had a lot of players unavailable either through injury, suspension or AFCON recently so hopefully with a few key players back we should see results improve

[Kerryblueboy]

It’s just classic moyes he errs on the side of caution always tries not to lose rather then make changes to try and win any team without the players we are missing would struggle but I would love to see him try something different sometimes like someone else said we knew the afcon players were heading off but he never gave dibling much game time beforehand

[Sir Stealth]

Expecting a massive upturn in form once our good players are back

Big picture - mid table mediocrity is welcome after the shit shows of the past few seasons so Moyes has done well.

On the flip side - if we were gonna lose a bunch a games with the big guys out/draw against the very worst sides in the league - I would have liked to have given more minutes to the young lads/fringe players

Aznou left mid seems such an obvious one to try even as a last 15mins option and move Grealish central

Frustrating seeing the ones who have been in terrible form for months like Mykolenko and McNeil keep on being given fresh chances

And the cautious-ness of Moyes is his biggest downfall sometimes

He has been a good appointment but I do look forward to a more progressive coach in the future

[AjaxAndy]

I think Moyes is relying on McNeil purely for his dead ball deliveries as he knows we aren't scoring from open play with all our creative players out.

Once Ndaiye, KDH and Grealish are all back together he'll obviously drop out and we'll be back to posing at least some kind of open play threat.

If we can sign an RB this window on loan or some pay in the summer deal then we'll be a much better proposition... We just need to get through this difficult period and hopefully kick on again.

Tough to watch right now but also I don't think there's much else he can do that would have any meaningful impact. The midfield we put out yesterday have no creativity, our wide players were anonymous and we had Beto up front. It's as turgid a lineup as you can get. Aznou and Armstrong were the only positives and that's mainly just because they are young players showing some promises rather than being stand out performers.

It's crap but it's not really on the manager that we've had a massive dip in form when all our decent offensive players are missing.

[StirlingBlue]

I’m going to give him the benefit of the doubt with McNeil - I reckon he was hoping for a screamer to put him in the shop window.

Moyes isn’t stupid, he knows McNeil isn’t good enough

[Audrey Horne]

I think Moyes is relying on McNeil purely for his dead ball deliveries as he knows we aren't scoring from open play with all our creative players out.

But he doesnt even take them? Garner does.